The present invention relates to an iced-confectionery article coated with batter and to a method for making such an article.
Iced cake articles comprising a center made of iced confectionary coated with a batter, in particular of the doughnut type which is deep-fat fried, currently exist. Usually, the ice-cream center is surrounded by a thin layer of unrisen batter and the whole is immersed in a boiling fatty substance to cook and brown this batter. The article must be eaten quickly because the ice cream is not protected against heat exchanges since it is in direct contact with the hot coating batter and it partially melts during the preparation. To industrially manufacture this type of product and to be able to transport and distribute it, it is necessary to overcome this difficulty.
Various solutions have been proposed to thermally insulate the center from the batter. In U.S Pat. No. 4,822,627, for example, a semi-finished article is made which is intended to be fried by the consumer. This article comprises of an ice-cream center coated with a multilayer coating composition suitable for deep-fat frying, comprising a first liquid layer which adheres to the center, onto which a second layer of breadcrumbs is incorporated and this second layer is itself coated with a third layer of liquid batter, the whole then being frozen. According to U.S. Pat. No. 4,708,881, for example, cream croquettes or decorated ice-cream articles can be made by carrying out the freezing in a freezer, tunnel or gyrofreezer in two steps. Thus, a center is first frozen under temperature conditions which produce a maximum amount of ice crystals, this center is then decorated or coated in an intermediate operation carried out outside the freezer and the composite product is treated in the same freezer at a lower temperature. Although it is mentioned that the center can be coated with a liquid composition and the whole fried, these operations are not described.
In U.S Pat. No. 4,020,188, an ice-cream center is formed and wrapped in a layered composite of rolled-out pastry with a continuous layer of protective material sitting next to the center and insulating the pastry from the center, and the whole is frozen and cooked.
The invention provides an iced-confectionery article having a center made of iced composition and including a coating of a cooked batter. The iced composition center of the article is coated directly with a coating composition made of meringue-like aerated frying batter which then is cooked to form the article. This article does not require an intermediate layer serving as a thermal barrier to insulate the center from the batter, and this is done without the batter soaking up liquid originating from melting of the iced composition. In one embodiment, the article according to the invention is a popsicle having a center whose shape includes concave parts, i.e. hollow parts, and comprises a handle stick, while in another embodiment, the iced popsicle is a ring-shaped doughnut.
The invention also relates to a method for making a coated iced-confectionary article as described above, characterized by the following steps: 1) an iced composition constituting the center is cooled so that its surface is at a temperature of not more than about xe2x88x9240xc2x0 C.; 2) the cooled center is dipped in a meringue-like aerated liquid frying batter; 3) the coated center is cooked for a period of time and at a temperature which allow the coating to be fried or cooked; and 4) the article is cooled to low temperature (i.e. below freezing) so as to freeze it and harden it.